Widescreen (Finally) Winning

Yort writes "There's a little blurb over at the IMDB about customers at Blockbuster now generally preferring the widescreen, or letterbox, format over full-screen. This after Blockbuster tried to only stock full screen versions of movies a few years ago. I guess now the wife will have to let me buy that new widescreen TV, right?"

Comments

It is a superior format

[revmoo]

Widescreen is undeniably a lot better way to watch a movie, and I'm sure that TV makers like it, because no one wants to watch a widescreen movie on a small TV

I think it will be really nice in a few years when widescreen TV's are the norm.

Re:It is a superior format

[gilesjuk]

Only because film makers shoot in widescreen, they haven't always. It was a gimmic to stop the decline of the cinema when TVs became popular.

Perhaps they will revert to a squarer image when all TVs are widescreen?

Widescreen is popular in the UK, go into an electrical store and you'll see rows of big widescreen TVs and only a handful of 4:3 tube sets.

Problem is the UK sets aren't HD yet and are unlikely to be for many years.

Re:It is a superior format

[mwolff]

I saw a short clip on letterbox vs. full on Turner Classic movies. I was shocked at how much was lost when it was converted from the original format to the full screen format. Entire characters would disappear sometimes. Since then I have only watched letterbox. It is the way the director intended you to view it.

Re:It is a superior format

[kungfuBreaks]

I've got a pathetically tiny TV, but I still rent widescreen whenever possible. Why? Because it looks a million times better, that's why. I never understood how people can be bothered by two little black bars but not by the fact they're missing a third of the frame...Bizarre.

Re:It is a superior format

[aardvarkjoe]

Wait a second ... isn't the whole argument for widescreen that "you lose information when changing the ratio"? I don't see how it's any better to crop (automatically -- even worse than by hand) TV shows instead of movies. I only occasionally watch movies at home (granted, I don't watch a whole lot of TV in general, but when I do, it's usually not movies.) Therefore, it seems that 4:3 is a better choice for me. Someone who watches a lot of movies might want to make the opposite choice.

Of course, the real solution is to have a high-resolution, large screen, so that letterboxed video doesn't look terrible. As it is, I'm rather indifferent to letterboxed movies -- it has its strong points, but you do lose a lot of detail. Unfortunately, I'm far too poor at the moment to go out and buy anything to make that a reality.

Re:It is a superior format

[stevelup]

Hi

This is simply wrong. When you watch an anamorphic widescreen DVD, your player is still outputting 480 (or 576 for PAL) lines of resolution, and your TV squashes the picture vertically. You get an even sharper and more detailed image. You most certainly *do not* lose resolution.

The exception to this is if your TV cannot do 16:9 compress, and/or you have your DVD player set to letterbox mode rather than 16:9 mode.

Re:It is a superior format

[instarx]

Cropping the top and the bottom of a 4:3 screen would have the added advntage of elliminating those annoying scrolling messages on all the news channels that take up 20% of the screen with useless graphics while repeating the same headlines ad nauseum.

Widescreen

[obotics]

The problem with widescreen at the moment is that TV is not broadcasted in widescreen. This means that quite a lot of your $10,000 TV is not being used when watching regular broadcast tv. Granted, I love widescreen for movies, but I also would like to see televion broadcasts switch over.

Still, I have to admit that those plasma TVs look darn nice!

Re:Widescreen

[Surak]

Actually, I've been seeing several broadcast TV shows being shown in letterbox lately...couldn't tell you which ones because I don't watch TV that much, but I think one of them was like Law and Order or some program similar to that.

Re:Widescreen

[Anonymous Coward]

A lot of the BBC output in the UK, and some of 5's esp films, is now broadcast in widescreen. I can't comment on ITV or Ch4, my freeview arial can't pick them up :)

Since I got Freeview a few months ago I have been converted totally to widescreen. I have a normal TV, so it's letterbox only, but even that is so much better. I would not have believed it until I'd got used to it.

Re:Widescreen

[Osty]

This means that quite a lot of your $10,000 TV is not being used when watching regular broadcast tv.

That may suck if you paid $10,000 for your TV, but when you can get good widescreen RPTVs for under $2000, it's not so bad. Modern TVs have ways of combatting the burn-in you'll see from the 4:3 sidebars (mine has grey sidebars, to at least get even burn of the phosphors since the problem with black bars is underburn rather than overburn of the phosphors, and it shifts the position of the 4:3 box to try to minimize burn-in from the bar edges). As well, you can change your format to fullscreen and learn to live with slightly fatter/shorter people and objects, or some TVs even come with a second stretch mode that stretches the edges more than the center. It can make for a fisheye view on some shows, but it's not too bad on most shows. Since most shows have all of the action in the center of the screen, that's the least-distorted part of the picture.

So, other than burn-in, what issues do you have with not using the full width of your TV? Plasma screens are very prone to burn-in, though, so aside from movie or strictly 16x9 HDTV viewing, they're pretty worthless (which would also help explain why the price is still so high -- their utility is limited, so demand is low and price stays high).

Re:Widescreen

[YetAnotherName]

US TV is broadcasted in widescreen:

* Alias (widescreen high def)
* Smart Travels (widescreen high def)
* My Wife and Kids (widescreen high def)
* George Lopez (widescreen high def)
* Star Trek Enterprise (letterboxed standard def)
* Law and Order (widescreen high def)
* Jay Leno (widescreen high def)
* Crime Scene Investigation (widescreen high def)
* Manor House (widescreen standard def)
* Animals Behaving Badly (widescreen standard def)
* E.T. (ABC commercial presentation, widescreen high def)
* Dragnet (widescreen high def)

You want more examples? There's a lot more!

Re:Widescreen

[MillionthMonkey]

The problem with widescreen at the moment is that TV is not broadcasted in widescreen.

Which only makes sense, given that widescreen owes its existence to the invention of television in the fifties. It was a typical fearful Hollywood reaction to advancing technology. They were scared green that people were going to stay home and watch TV instead of going out to the movies. By making the screen wider, they figured they had a selling point over television- you're getting "more movie" along the edges! Not to mention the fact that they could screw up the aspect ratio between the two formats this way. You have to choose between truncated edges, stretched faces, or black bars on your TV screen. That was quite intentional.

Of course, another way of looking at it is that they decreased the height, rather than increased the width. They made the movie screen shorter than the TV screen, not wider. That's why you get those black bars. There's no inherent reason why a wider aspect ratio is any better in the first place. It's like saying it's better to have a volume knob that goes up to 11.

This means that quite a lot of your $10,000 TV is not being used when watching regular broadcast tv. Granted, I love widescreen for movies, but I also would like to see televion broadcasts switch over.

If TV broadcasts switch to 2.35:1 to catch up, movies will start coming out with 4:1 and 5:1 aspect ratios. They'll film their stuff on a thin horizontal strip if that's what it takes to screw you over.

Re:Widescreen

[drudd]

There's no inherent reason why a wider aspect ratio is any better in the first place.

I disagree... I think we're used to seeing the world in a pretty wide aspect ratio... compare how your peripheral vision compares left to right as up and down. I can see ~40-60 degrees more left to right (just a quick approximation).

I think the wider view is more immersive... not necessarily as good as having an IMAX type screen where you can't see the whole screen unless you turn your head, but we can't all afford that :)

Doug

Re:Widescreen

[JDWTopGuy]

I don't care, I'm not happy until America's Funniest Home Videos is in widescreen HD!!!

Why are you looking at me like that?

OH!!! Duh. Uh, nevermind.

Re:Widescreen

[Eccles]

I disagree... I think we're used to seeing the world in a pretty wide aspect ratio..

I looked it up once, and came up with the conclusion that 5:3 was our "natural" aspect ratio. Clearly wider than 4:3, but a little narrower than 16:9 (since 5:3 would be 15:9.)

I think the wider view is more immersive... not necessarily as good as having an IMAX type screen where you can't see the whole screen unless you turn your head, but we can't all afford that :)

How about using a projector like a Dell 2100MP? $1300 list, 800x600 res, make your movie room dark and you can make as big an image as you have a wall for (pref. with a screen on it, of course.) You can even adjust the zoom for best fit of widescreen vs. 4:3, perhaps with black drapes and the like to properly frame the image.

Re:Widescreen

[MillionthMonkey]

They'll keep switching ratios until they make TVs with adjustable screens that you can pull up and down. That's when the triangular movies are going to start coming out.

Eventually all movies will be shown on a torus, "as the director intended". There will be a big hole in the middle of the round screen, and the actors never stand in it.

Re:Widescreen

[Osty]

You don't know much about economics, do you? Low demand results in low price, not high price. It is when people want lots of something, such as those Tickle Me Elmos or Beanie Babies, that the price skyrockets.

I don't want to have to give another economics lecture, so I'll keep this brief. Supply slopes up (price on the Y axis, units on the X, as price increases more units can be produced). Demand slopes down (as price drops, more units are demanded). I was referring to plasma TVs which certainly are not in short supply. However, the price is high and so there is little demand. If plasma TVs were more compelling, the demand would increase and the suppliers could lower the price to sell more units. I would say plasma TVs are demand-limited. Not enough people want them to make it economical to drop the price for those who do buy. You referred to items that were clearly supply-limited. More people wanted them than there was supply to meet, and so those who were really interested were willing to pay more. Sometimes much more. They're different concepts, different models for different scenarios.

And just in case you wanted to bring up the fact that prices drop when people don't want something anymore (closeout sales, bargain bins), you need to realize that usually happens at the end of a product's life, not the beginning. You'll also notice that unless the product is complete crap (and sometimes not even then), reducing the price increases the demand for the product (ie, you sell of your remaining stock faster than if you had left the price high), once again showing that price falls as demand increases.

Finally, I'm ignoring factors such as cost of production. I said "help explain", which means this is only part of the price. Maybe plasma TVs can't feasibly drop below $5000 (guesstimate) because they cost too much to produce at the moment. However, even that is affected somewhat by supply and demand -- higher demand means more units can be sold, which means more units can be supplied, which usually translates into better economies of scale and cheaper production. As well, extra profits can be channeled into research and development, creating newer and cheaper ways of producing the technology, thus further reducing the costs of manufacturing and allowing the prices to drop even more, thus stimulating even more demand, and the cycle repeats. But all of this will not happen until and unless the demand for the product increases.

Re:Widescreen

[Bishop923]

One small nit on some of the standard def "letterbox" shows like Enterprise and West Wing, they arent "really" 16x9, they are usually ~14x9, (My HDTV has a 14x9 zoom mode with small grey bars on either side, Enterprise fits it almost perfectly).

I suppose its a way to give the widescreen look while still offering enough of the 4:3 screen so the majority of viewers dont raie hell about only getting "half" a show.

Good comparison site

[teko_teko]

This site has some samples of movies in widescreen format and the result that one will get in the full screen format. widescreen.org.
The full screen version of LoTR is really bad because of its original screen ratio.

Re:Good comparison site

[_|()|\|]

This site has some samples of movies in widescreen format and the result that one will get in the full screen format.

It would be more useful if the pictures were shown at the same width. Showing them at the same height is like comparing a 27" full-screen TV (~$500) to a 32" wide-screen TV (~$1,500).

Yeah!

[sg3000]

The masses choose wide screen over full screen! Next, we have to wean them off of pro wrestling, Brittany Spears, and lite beer and the 2000s won't end up being an embarrassment to history! Or at least we'll be cooler than the 1920s, with their flagpole sitting and zootsuits.

Re:Yeah!

[Bendy Chief]

My friend, we have nothing to fear. We came after the beat poets of the late fifties/early sixties, and no one can ever put them to shame for lameness, daddy-o.

Re:Yeah!

[reverseengineer]

A zoot suit generally refers to a brightly colored, usually baggy suit, often worn with a wide-brimmed fedora and a pocketwatch or wallet chain of absurd length. They were most popular in the 1930s and 1940s, but had a brief upsurge in popularity during that swing music craze a couple years ago. On that subject, the "Zoot Suit Riot" was more than a Cherry Poppin' Daddies hit- it was a real event in 1943?, a vicious 10-day race riot between sailors and hispanics (who wore the namesake garment). And yes, they are still cool.

Upgrading

[darkov]

While I think releasing DVDs in widescreen is the way to go, I've noticed that more and more programs on my TV are being letterboxed, probably becuase programs are increasingly being distributed and broadcast in HD.

Meanwhile the effective size of my TV screen is being erroded beacuse of this letterboxing. Damned progress.

Re:Upgrading

[ergo98]

I've noticed that more and more programs on my TV are being letterboxed...

No, that's to cater to the sucker mentality that letterbox=elite (as is evidenced throughout this thread): When a show or commercial wants to seem classy or refined, here comes the letterbox!

The reality, of course, is that watching a letterboxed movie on a require it to be letterbox, like wide scenic vistas. The overwhelming majority of movies are dramas and comedies where P&S is absolutely sufficient to convey the theater experience in the home). The usable resolution is dramatically reduced (your TV doesn't suddenly sprout more lines of resolution), giving you a technically inferior picture, all the while the elitists crow about how letterbox is the only way to go...uh huh.

For a couple of movies I get the letterboxed, but by and large I get P&S full screen. It's a waste of resolution to do otherwise.

Re:Upgrading

[darkov]

No, that's to cater to the sucker mentality that letterbox=elite (as is evidenced throughout this thread): When a show or commercial wants to seem classy or refined, here comes the letterbox!

To a degree, but It can be valid, if I were shooting in a HD aspect ratio I'd probably be pretty frustrated to find that my shots ended up looking crappy in the narrow aspect. Good composition would be very difficult (if not impossible) to achive for both aspects at the same time.

But then again, we are talking about TV, not high art.

No need to buy a widescreen

[joeflies]

Considering that the cost of front projection DLP is falling fast, I'd skip the widescreen tv route entirely. You get whatever aspect ratio you need.
Even if you do go rear rear projection or tubes, I think I'd still go with a bigger 4:3 (as long as it supported 16x9 compression, like the Sony's or JVCs)

Re:No need to buy a widescreen

[Jeff DeMaagd]

Just about every new TV set larger than 27" sold in the US has a 16x9 squeeze mode. A scarce few of them autodetect the anamorphic flag and autoswitch, but not all DVD players send that flag either.

Most projectors can adjust aspect ratios to fit the available panel.

Even so, I think my next projector will be a 1366 x 768 widescreen so it will take 720p HDTV without down scaling. I haven't decided if it will be DLP or LCD, LCDs are cheaper, still get a decent contrast ratio (some at 900:1) and don't have DLP rainbows.

DLPs do have better contrast ratio, sometimes up to 2000:1 but I think I might be bothered by rainbowing.

Widescreen = Bedda!

[CyberBill]

My parents always watch DVDs in pan-n-scan, because my dad says "We bought a big tv and that widescreen doesnt use it, what a waste!", but I personally ONLY watch DVD's in widescreen unless not available. You can see a lot more of whatever is going on, I feel. :)

-Bill

Re:Widescreen = Bedda!

[drinkypoo]

So of the fact that he got you episode 2 and the fact that it is p&s, which is the insult and which is the injury?

Do Not Underestimate Customers

[thatguywhoiam]

I remember buying American Beauty last year on VHS, as a gift for my sister. The clerk asked me 3 times whether I was sure I wanted widescreen. When I assured her that I most definitely did and asked what the hell the problem was, she replied "We get at least 10 people a day in here returning widescreen movies because they think something is wrong with them. They say they 'don't fill up the TV screen.'"

I find, generally, that when you say 'aspect ratio' to your average layperson they say 'gesundheit'.

Re:Do Not Underestimate Customers

[_|()|\|]

I remember buying American Beauty last year on VHS, as a gift for my sister. The clerk asked me 3 times whether I was sure I wanted widescreen.

You have to admit that wide-screen VHS is a small market. Wide-screen anamorphic DVD is popular because it displays at a high resolution on a decent TV. Wide-screen VHS looks bad on any TV.

HD tv

[mjdth]

isn't HD tv's native format widescreen? wouldn't this help to get every type of TV media on the same page?

That depends...

[raehl]

SOME TV is not broadcast in wide screen. Some is. I'm pretty sure all of the late-night shows are filmed in wide screen now for example.

Now, whether the broadcaster in your area is broadcasting that wide-screen signal, or your cable provider is carrying it, is another matter entirely.

How?!

[limekiller4]

Call me a snob, a bigot, whatever. But I cannot fathom how people stomach non-widescreen. I mean, it's cutting off sizeable chunks of what the director intended you to see. With competent editing it is a disaster. With incompetent editing it's unwatchable.

How the hell are you supposed to watch Kubrick or Kurosawa, for that matter, on a format other than they shot it in and not walk away with (almost literally) half the picture?

Re:How?!

[Anonymous Coward]

You are a snob, a bigot, whatever!

Happy?

Re:How?!

[farnsworth]

How the hell are you supposed to watch Kubrick

Kubrick typically prints the entire film negative, giving you a 4:3 aspect ratio, i.e., "not widescreen". Almost everyone else cuts off the top and bottom of the film to give you 16:9.

You make a good point, but keep in mind that "what the director intended you to see" does not always mean "widescreen."

Re:How?!

[Belgand]

IIRC he saw one of his early films on tv at one point and was appalled at how it had been mangled. In order to be certain that this would not continue to happen from then on he set up his shots such that 4:3 would contain the full shot, but that nothing significant would be lost when it was matted for 16:9 to be projected in theaters. Thus the majority of Kubrick films are correctly in 4:3 on DVD and video, but actually slightly off in the theater. While not a "Kubrick film" Spartacus is a notable exception having a rather wide ratio, 2.2:1 (70mm) going by the back of the box for the Criterion DVD release. 1.85:1 (academy flat) and 2.35:1 (anamorphic scope aka Panavision/Cinemascope) tend to be the standard two widescreen ratios.

Likewise films before the 1950s were largely filmed in 4:3 (academy standard). This is the main reason why televisions are also 4:3. When the NTSC chose an aspect ratio standard they went with academy standard. Films later went widescreen to offer something above and beyond television.

Re:How?!

[kgp]

Obviously you have not actually watched all the Kubrick movies from DVD. All his non-anamorphic movies are intended to be 4:3. At least EWS, The Shining and Full Metal Jacket are.

Really. There's even a comment at the beginning of "Eyes Wide Shut" DVD that says "as the director intended"! Shocking but true. Same for all of his other movies.

You can get Lolita (and others) in wide screen although the original was shot in 4:3.

Other directors go the other way: Woody Allen has it written into his film contracts that his movies may only be released in widescreen.

BTW, the way a lot of "conventional" (i.e. non-anamporphic) widescreen movies are converted to 4:3 is by not putting the matte in when transfering to video. These movies (and TV shows) are shot onto 4:3 ratio 35mm stock. The view-finder might have 16:9 or 2.35:1 or whatever pair of lines set up (usually in the 24 frame video) so the director can see what he intends to put on screen but light lands across the entire frame. Rather than pan and scanning you get more info than you expect.

This leads to odd bugs: in the opening scene of Apocolypse Now there is a chopper shot with view over the jungle (shot from the helicopter). In the widescreen version it looks fine. You are flying over he jungle in some undefined manner. In the 4:3 version you can see the choppers shadow in the lower left corner.

Ok, so we're half way there

[decarelbitter]

Because most modern movies are recorded in Cinemascope, which is not 16:9, but 2.35:1. So cool movies like LOTR still have a nice black bar on the top and bottom when viewed on a Shiny! 16:9 plasma screen.

Re:Ok, so we're half way there

[great throwdini]

Because most modern movies are recorded in Cinemascope, which is not 16:9, but 2.35:1.

The underlying suggestion being that movies should all be shot to the same aspect ratio? What on earth do you think we're halfway to? One binding aspect ratio for all visual media? Nonsense.

Considering the back-catalog of film and television production and the range of screen dimensions they cover ... well, let's just say I still don't see a "halfway" to *anything* in this.

Wide vs Full

[Masem]

I realize that to provide both a widescreen and a fullscreen version, with 5.1 sound and little encoding artifacts, would generally require a second disk for most feature films, I don't understand the trend currently for many newer movies to have separate boxes for Wide and Full, particularly when the version info is not easy to pick out (Now whenever I get a DVD, I doublecheck the back of the box to get all the formatting information to make sure it's what I expect). The old Warner DVD titles were flippies in that one side was full, the other wide, but this means you didn't have a picture on the DVD media itself (oh, boo hoo!). It would seem to me that providing both versions of the movie on a flippy disk in one box would be cheaper than making up two distribution runs, particularly when the number of full vs. wide is still rapidly changing.

of course

[Darth Maul]

The widescreen version is better because it is the full frame as the cinematographer and director intended. Anything 'pan and scan' cuts out about a third of the frame. But we all know that.

I bought a widescreen HDTV a few months ago and I must say there is no going back to standard 4:3. Even if you do not watch/get HD feeds, I highly recommend the new widescreen HDTVs for DVD watching. Even without my HD receiver, I'd still have purchased the TV just for the DVD experience. Now, of course, I'm an anamorphic snob ;-).

Re:of course

[Anonymous Coward]

The widescreen version is better because it is the full frame as the cinematographer and director intended.

It's not that simple, dude.

Some directors these days compose for 1.33:1 and 2.35:1 at the same time. James Cameron and Steven Soderberg do this. So when you see a 1.33:1, "full screen" transfer of one of their movies, you are seeing what the cinematographer and director (who in Soderberg's case is the same guy) intended.

They do this in TV all the time these days. The vast majority of scripted TV is composed for center-punch 1.33:1 and 1.78:1 at the same time, so it can be transferred to either SDTV or HDTV without panning or tilting.

I guess...

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess asking "Do you have this in widescreen?" every time I rented from Blockbuster actually made a difference, eh? (I mean the collective difference of thousands of movie fanatics all doing the same thing.)

Somebody please tell my local Blockbuster

[Osty]

I rented the Bourne Identity last week, and imagine my surprise when I got it home and realized it was the Pan&Scan version. Now, there's a reason why I have a widescreen TV -- I like widescreen. I don't want to spend $4.50 on a movie rental and then lose half of the image. This wouldn't be so bad if the DVD display case said in prominent lettering "Fullscreen Version" or "NOT Widescreen", but it said nothing. Since it didn't explicitly say it was the fullscreen version, I just naively assumed that DVD == Widescreen unless otherwise specified. I won't be fooled again. I guess I'll stick with Netflix from now on.

Re:Somebody please tell my local Blockbuster

[Osty]

Here's a tip for ya: Don't go to Blockbuster. Renting movies at Blockbuster is like clothes shopping at Wal-Mart or eating at McDonald's.

Where, then, should I go when I need a quick movie fix? If I don't feel like waiting several days for the Netflix mailers to arrive, or even longer if the movie is popular, what do I do? There's Blockbuster, with a great assortment of movies, though I do have to comb pretty carefully now to be sure I'm getting what I want, and there's ... not much more. I used to love Hollywood Video, but there's not one conveniently close to me. I don't want to go miles out of the way just to rent a movie.

And what's wrong with clothes shopping at Wal-Mart? Does it really matter where you buy your underwear or socks? Sure, you probably won't buy anything more than a T-shirt or two otherwise, but underwear and socks are important too. And McDonald's is a great place to grab a quick bite when you're on the run. Is it good for you? Probably not. Are there better places? Most assuredly. But McD's is quick, and it's convenient, and so long as you don't eat there every single day it's not going to kill you.

But then, I guess we can't all be pretentious, can we?

It depends where you are

[EnglishTim]

Here in the UK quite a lot of the digital channels are broadcast in widescreen, and all the free-to-air digital channels are.

Seems like almost all the TVs in the shops are widescreen now, as well.

Re:It depends where you are

[El Cabri]

In Europe TV broadcasted movies and VHS were universally letter-boxed even before 16:9 TVs appeared. Maybe it's because the higher vertical resolution in the PAL and SECAM standards compared to NTSC makes the waste of scanlines less painful for picture quality (which is not an issue now with anamorphic DVDs anyway).

Re:It depends where you are

[Qube]

Much of the UK analogue output is in semi-widescreen (14:9) now too; gives only small black bars on 4:3 sets and means less stretching for the widescreen TVs to do.

On digital, Sky are about to move their movie channels and stuff like Sky One over to widescreen fulltime. When Sky does it, you know it's popular enough :)

Re:I personally find it infuriating....

[alphaseven]

Flame all you want, but after the first month, approximately 100% of people who watch any movie will be watching it on a T.V., so why the hell wouldn't you design the movie to be seen on that medium?

A few directors do that, Stanley Kubrick shot most of his films in something closer to a TV ratio (the top and bottom would be cropped off in theatres) and I read an interview with Cronenberg where he stated that he tried to frame his films with the expectation they will be shown in a television ratio.

We need more models of widescreen TV in stores

[grahamwest]

If only widescreen TVs would become more commonly available in the USA - last time I was back in Britain visiting family I found you were hard pressed even to find a 4:3 TV in stores. The little 10" TV/VCR combo units were about the only ones left, everything else was 16:9. This is because the upcoming DTV standard for Europe is 16:9.

That said, Panasonic sell a nice 30" and 34" 16:9 HDTV tube TV in this country. Movies and videogames look phenomenal those sets and they're a lot cheaper than plasma displays.

Re:Honest question

[DeltaSigma]

You! You people are the ones that screwed up the internet! I hate you all!

Man, if they don't have the processing power for flash they should get a better computer.

I shall hunt down every last one of your kind until the internet is pure and w3c compliant...

Explanation is Simple

[tabdelgawad]

With decent (not great!) 27" TVs dipping below $200, the median size of TVs in US households must be significantly higher than it was a few years ago. This tends to resolve the tradeoff between letterbox and fullscreen in favor of letterbox.

I tell fullscreen supporters...

[shepd]

Your DVD player has a zoom feature (most do, anyways). USE IT! That way we both win.

Re:I tell fullscreen supporters...

[John Miles]

This method won't work until DVDs store info about the area of focus, and can pan&scan on-the-fly, to any ratio your player wants to put it in.

Which they've actually always been able to do. That's why your DVD player's setup menu has a preference field for the selection of 'full screen' or 'widescreen'. Widescreen DVDs that offer P&S-on-the-fly support will play back in fullscreen mode if you set up your player that way.

However, very few discs have taken advantage of the P&S-on-the-fly feature. I'm not sure why; it may be because the telecine P&S process has more options available than the automatic feature provides, like zooming.

The original pressing of the Last Temptation of Christ DVD actually enabled this feature by mistake. Viewers with the fullscreen option turned on were rewarded with a corrupted P&S picture (well, more corrupted than usual). I imagine they've fixed this by now.

Because the format sucks?

[Kjella]

No, seriously... 4:3 is nice for a newsreporter, or a solo artist etc. But compared to the human field of vision, it's hopeless. And if you're looking to convey a "realistic" scene, you can either squeeze all the actors together, or you can have basicly a lot of ground and sky that would be "outside" the letterbox. Either way it sucks, and I'm glad we're moving to a format that is at least closer to the experience you get at a cinema. Note that cinema producers would actually like it even more rectangular, like 1,85:1 or 2,35:1. Personally I have a 32" widescreen (not HD) TV, and it's great for watching DVDs.

Kjella

Viewing 16:9 movies on 4:3 TVs

[Dwindlehop]

Sony 4:3 televisions have a feature that will compress the scan lines into a 16:9 format. You lose surface area, but you don't lose any of the pixels. Great way to get quality 16:9 movie playback on the cheap (less than a thousand bucks).

Re:Viewing 16:9 movies on 4:3 TVs

[tenton]

Not just Sonys. Many of the newer TVs are coming with it (Panasonic, Toshiba, and Samsung are among the other ones I've seen with the vertical compression). They'll call it 16:9 mode, or something like that (depends on the manufacturer).

Better than having the DVD player generate the black bars and combining lines of video (reducing the vertical resolution).

Mismatched solutions...

[Zinho]

The saddest thing I've seen lately is a letter-boxed widescreen movie played on a widescreen TV in a store display. The letterbox effect printed on the DVD shrunk the image vertically to accommodate the aspect ratio of most TVs. The widescreen TV, for some unfathomable reason, stretched the image it was given to fit the wider aspect ratio of the widescreen TV. The result was a short, elongated version of the original movie, and I don't think the implementation could have been further from the intent of its designers (the film makers). There's no way I was going to even consider buying that TV. Unfortunately, most of the "widescreen" TVs I look at (casual inspection only) seem to be pulling the same "stretch it a little and no one will notice" trick, so unless I hear that the industry is making an effort to coordinate solutions I'm not putting my hard-earned $thousands into the new technology.

Two possible solutions:
(1) sell widescreen format movies that look weird on normal sets because they'd be squished horizontally.
(2) make the TV able to recognize the letterbox format and adjust intelligently.

My vote is on option 2 - better backwards compatibility. I just hope that the industry picks soon and sticks with the decision.

Re:Mismatched solutions...

[specialized_sworks]

Easy solution...

The DVD player was set to 4:3 instead of 16:9. They all (most) have a setting to tell them what kind of TV you have. There is no way for them to tell automatically.

In fact, a while ago a large number of DVD players defaulted to 16:9. That resulted in many returns by customers because they thought the DVD player was broken. So, now they default to 4:3. I guess they figure if you can afford a new 16:9 TV, you might be bright enough to read the manual.

-Dubya

Re:Mismatched solutions...

[Krokus]

The reason DVD imagery tends to look awful on widescreen TVs in shops is typically because they have the same signal running to multiple TVs, at least some of which are 4:3. For some odd reason, they tend to configure this shared display for the lowest-common (or perhaps better selling) denominator.

The fact that each TV is showing an image that has been been split multiple times also tends to result in image quality quite inferior to what the TV is capable of producing with a single connection.

This is why I don't judge a TV based on whatever it's displaying in a shop. I use the internet to find in-depth reviews carried out under more controlled conditions. I mean, if it's on the internet, it must be reliable, right? :)

here is an example.

[geekoid]

The second example from the bottom is enough to sell me on widescreen.

except

[geekoid]

in 30 years there will be a new generation of geeks telling us about all the advantages of this new "SquareScreen"(tm) movie format.

Advantages of Widescreen?

[Psx29]

I am curios as to if Widescreen is really a better format for things beside movies? I am curious if there is any advantage to widescreen for standard made for tv/video releases? I know widescreen is good for the movies and therefore it is best to watch the movies in their original form but quite frankly, I don't see the problem with standard 4:3 for everything else?

Re:Advantages of Widescreen?

[santos_douglas]

The idea behind widescreen is that it approximates the human field of view better than the standard mostly square picture on a 4:3 TV. I think it translates well to TV programming in ways that may take some time for TV producers to understand and take advantage of. For instance on 4:3, in a close up shot, notice it's often difficult to squeeze more then two faces into a single shot because of the aspect ratio, but on widescreen this is now problem. Some of the better TV commercials will even throw in letterboxing just to get the proper effect.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:As usual...

[geekd]

Too bad widescreen films didn't appear until 1953, after 4:3 TV format was established.

Films went widescreen in response to TV:

"Oh, crap. People can watch moving pictures in thier home now. What are we gonna do?"

"We'll make the show really wide so to differentiate ourselves, and continue to make money"

Halo isn't widescreen

[Osty]

I'm glad Microsoft was smart enough to put in HD and widescreen formats built into the X-Box. Once you go widescreen Halo, there's no going back.

Except that Halo is a 4:3 game, not 16:9. Sure, you can display it in fullscreen mode on a wide TV, but that's just stretching things horizontally. The XBox supports 480p (4:3 and 16:9), 720p, and 1080i (only 16:9 for both of those, IIRC), but only if the developers choose to support them in their game. 480p 4:3 generally comes for free. 480p 16:9 may have some effect on your textures or HUD. 720p and 1080i generally need you to rethink your engine design.

That said, Halo2 is supposed to support 480p 16:9 and 720p, so you will eventually be able to experience a Halo game in widescreen glory. Just not now.

There are a few widescreen games out there, though. Hitman2 (480i 16:9, not 480p), Sega GT 2002, Tony Hawk 4 (and possibly 3? 720p, 480p 16:9), Amped, and more. Check out this thread for an ongoing list.

Reminds me of what a Suncoast employee said once..

[D'Arque Bishop]

"Pan-and-scan is formatted for the small-minded."

Re:I personally find it infuriating....

[fyonn]

approximately 100% of people who watch any movie will be watching it on a T.V., so why the hell wouldn't you design the movie to be seen on that medium?

well, here in the UK, they *are* designing their movie to be viewed on tv. we've mostly converted to widescreen here... and in much of the rest of europe. you have to go out of your way to find 4:3 stuff, both hardware and software. a friend of mine is looking for the second harry potter film on dvd in 4:3 and it's not available yet. you've been able to get the widescreen one for a while now but the 4:3 one is not even out.

dave

2 Discs are better anyway I think.

[SaraSmith]

I have a 3 disc changer on my DVD player, so for movies with more than one disc, like LOTR, I just push a button and it switches discs.

Great for VCD/SVCD movies on multiple discs too.

For double sided DVDs, like the one I have of animated Spawn episodes from Wal-Mart's $5 bin, I have to open the tray, get up, switch to a different disc so I can get at the one I need to flip over, flip it, close the tray, switch back to that disc....

Sure it's not hard, but pushing one button is a lot easier, especially if the movie itself is on more than one disc. I can live with a bit of work for extras, but getting up in the middle of the actual movie is annoying.

1.33:1 vs. 1.78:1 vs. 2.35:1

[-tji]

If at all possible, I don't watch anything in 4:3. Any widescreen movies converted to 4:3 are absolutely butchered.

But an interesting thing I noticed recently was a movie that had different versions on both sides (The Truth about Charlie). But, rather than the 4:3 or native aspect ratio choice that many movies give; it had choices of 16:9 or native 2.35:1.

I find that the "butchering" is much less severe when going from 2.35:1 down to 16:9 / 1.78:1. But, I chose the 2.35:1 side, to see the movie in it's full glory.

BTW - The movie was less than stellar, except for the presence of Thandie Newton.. She is gorgeous.. which helps improve any action movie (she was the hot spy chick in Mission Impossible 2)

they neglect to mention something

[Meeble]

they neglected something on this one....

blockbuster still continues the practice of stocking only widescreen formats. My local BB here in CNY had like 40 some copies of harry potter 2 on dvd. the entire group was widescreen only. I've noticed this for several other titles.

not that I'm saying widescreen isn't better, but it seems in my head wouldn't that impair a studies nbrs a bit if some big new releases aren't even sotcked with an option ?!?

Not correct.

[MtViewGuy]

Actually, most movies today are shot in 1.85:1 aspect ratio, NOT 2.35:1 aspect ratio. This is because the 1.85:1 aspect ratio is the hard-matted default aspect ratio of the large movie cameras from Panavision and Arriflex.

It's only blockbuster movies that are shot in 2.35:1 aspect ratio, mostly to give a bigger sense of epic sweep. For example, the three Lord of the Rings movies are shot this way because we are talking three movies that we can easily call epics.

The reason why every HDTV system around the world chose 16:9 (1.78:1) aspect ratio is that it's very close to the 1.85:1 aspect ratio used by movie cameras.

time to buy a 16:9 tv? maybe not...

[edwinolson]

I'm not sure how the pricing is now, but when I bought my TV, you paid a big premium for a 16:9 screen. In fact, it was so large a premium that buying a 32" 4:3 TV was a LOT cheaper than a 27" 16:9. If you do the math, the 32" displaying a 16:9 image is equivalent to a 29" 16:9 screen.

And of course, a 4:3 tv is a lot more useful for the bulk of television programming.

(The TV in question is an absolutely awesome Samsung Tantus digital. Highly recommend it!)

Re:dvd format is to blame

[Dimensio]

The DVD format allows what you've mentioned. Few DVDs utilize this feature, however. Further, this feature is not useful for open-matte movies where the 'widescreen' actually cuts picture infomration (albeit information that should not be within the frame), especially with open-matte movies with hard-matted special effects shots like Back to the Future.

Fullscreen not always inappropriate

[Trogre]

Disclaimer: I prefer widescreen.
Anti-disclaimer: But I can see why not everyone would.

For low-resolution formats such as VHS, full-screen may still be preferrable, since you've only got so many pixels[*] to play with, and using up a third of the picture with black bars further lowers the effective vertical resolution of the actual picture.

Of course I realise that strictly it's not 'adding black bars' but zooming out to see the full picture, but the result is the same.

The big advantage with widescreen is being able to see the 'whole' scene, not just the centre of attention. There are some movies where what's happening at the periphery of the screen just isn't important (mainly chick flicks, I guess), but you want to see as much detail as possible in the foreground (auch as characters faces, or writing on surfaces). In these circumstances full-screen may be preferrable to widescreen.

Another case is when you're a poor student and only have a 14" telly. Suddenly screen real-estate becomes paramount, and wide-screen just isn't an option unless you want to park your chair 1 metre from the set.

[*] I realise that in the video industry the term 'pixels' is discouraged since measurements are done in 'lines'. Video signals are stored and transmitted in pixels nonetheless.

Re:As usual...

[Sycraft-fu]

Well there is also the issue that we see more horizontally than verticly, about twice as much. Also films have no one standard for widescreen. 1.85:1, 2:1 and 2.35:1 are some common anamorphic lense formats, but they aren't the only ones. Also some films are shot with spherical glass and then hard matted to the desired ratio (Fight Club for example).

I'm also not sure when the concept of anamorphic lenses came about, which is how widescreen is generally done. In case you don't know, anamorphic lense are squashed, so the image on the film is also squashed. You then hook the same kind of lense to the projector which unsquashes the image. Gets better resolution than doing the same shot with aspherical lens and cropping it since you use more of the film, but has trouble with some aspects of focus. Look at lights in teh distance in Fight Club and contrast them to other movies and you'll see the difference.

It may be that the move to widescreen was partially motivated by TV aspect ratio but I think it was more due to the natural percetion of humans and also perhaps the invention or refinement of anamorphic lenses.

Re:Widescreen TVs suck

[Anonymous Coward]

The original point of having a wide screen cinema wasn't to make the screen 'wide' but to make it 'huge'.

Actually it was to fill the viewers field of vision.

This is good to hear

[rikkards]

About 2 months ago I actually sat down and sent an email to Blockbuster saying that I was disappointed that they carried one movie in only Fullscreen. I did get a response back from them that sounded like they have received more than my email. I also said that if they didn't carry it in Widescreen I would go to Rogers (which is probably their biggest competition in Canada) since they usually did. Glad to see somethings do work by sending (constructive) feedback.

The funny thing is they seem to be carrying sometimes both widescreen and full for the same movie (i.e Red Dragon) All the widescreen versions were mostly gone however only about 3 of 20 copies in fullscreen were taken.

It is NOT a superior format

[dnoyeb]

I do not like wide screen at all. I do not know why people are calling wide screen some kind of movie gimmic. It seems obvious to anyone with geometry 101 that a theater full of people is better suited by a rectangle than a square. But when you are close to the screen, a square seems more natural. So at home the TV has a more ergonomic shape, and the rectangle is more ergonomic for the theater.

I do not like wide screen TVs at home. I don't really see the point besides not losing something from the widescreen movies.

Re:As usual...

[Waffle Iron]

Gets better resolution than doing the same shot with aspherical lens and cropping it since you use more of the film, but has trouble with some aspects of focus. Look at lights in teh distance in Fight Club and contrast them to other movies and you'll see the difference.

The first rule of filming Fight Club is: You do not use a low f-stop.

The second rule of filming Fight Club is: You do not use a low f-stop.

In the average consumer's eye

[Pingsmoth]

the widescreen format is inferior to pan-and-scan. I run the movie department of a local grocery store and most people don't understand the concept of "those black bars at the top and bottom." I used to get frustrated and try to explain to them that they are really seeing the whole movie, but it looks smaller on their TV, so the average person doesn't want it. I've been buying widescreen movies since they were available on VHS, and I can remember watching many of them on my 13" TV. That's not to say everyone can do it, though. Most people just want to watch a movie, and don't care about the trees on the side of the scene that get cut out in pan and scan format.

Anymore, I just explain the differences to my customers but let them discover on their own which format they prefer. I can understand the reasons behind choosing pan and scan, even though I know it means you have to effectively miss out on half of the movie.

I get 192

[sporkboy]

since standard VHS uses 240 scanlines (had to look up the exact number), multiply by the ratios and it comes out to 192 lines in use.

Of course the number would be lower for films (most big-budget films today) which are actually done in a 1.85:1 or 2.35:1 aspect ratio.

173 or so for 1.85
136 or so for 2.35 (lord of the rings for instance uses this res).

Anamorphic DVD on the other hand, on a good TV with 16:9 native or squeeze mode will use all 480 lines for 16:9 material, and the relevant fractions for "wider" screens. Much much better.

This is the same Blockbuster that edits content

[gad_zuki!]

Great, now I can watched widescreen NC-17 and other films edited by the studio for "family-friendly" stores like Blockbuster and Walmart because these stores will refuse to carry content they find religiously/morally questionable. The studios don't want to lose money so there goes the penis scene from Bad Lieutenant. I can't remember any others from the top of my head, but the editing is quite real.

They need to widen their tolerance not their aspect ratios.

Re:This is the same Blockbuster that edits content

[maroon_dog]

Blockbuster doesn't edit. Walmart doesn't edit. The studios made the choice to edit. If you want NC-17 don't go to blockbuster or walmart. Otherwise its like complaing becaues your local Ford dealer doesn't sell Chevys.

Re:This is the same Blockbuster that edits content

[SuiteSisterMary]

No, WalMart, for example, doesn't edit.

But when they say 'Edit, or we don't carry it, and you lose over 30 percent of your gross for it, off the top,' they're certainly imposing their morality needlessly.

Hey, cool, but...

[trudyscousin]

...this guy is going to be so upset.

UK leads the way with widescreen TV

[rklrkl]

Unusually for once in the realm of TV, the UK has a clear lead in the widescreen arena:

• 16:9 sets have been outselling 4:3 sets significantly in the past 3-4 years, so much so that it's virtually impossible to find any set over 20" that's in the old-fashioned 4:3 format.

• Almost all UK-made dramas aired on UK TV are now widescreen - in fact, if a new UK drama airs that isn't widescreen, I find it quite shocking :-)

• The majority of UK TV adverts are now widescreen.

• More and more "cheap and cheerful" UK TV shows are being aired widescreen (home makeovers, quiz shows, gardening etc. etc.). BBC and Channel 4 have been the leaders in this, with ITV begin somewhat behind and the laggards at Sky One bringing up a distant last place.

• Sky (the largest UK digital TV platform) has just made all its "Sky Box Office" pay-per-view movies widescreen (what about the normal movie channels too, Sky ?).

I was amused that I had to beg the BBC a couple of years ago to air "Film [insert year here] with Jonathan Ross" in widescreen, because they amazingly shot Ross's studio reviews in 4:3 and then had letterboxed movie clips. The series that followed finally switched to widescreen - amazing that the most obvious BBC show to get widescreen (a movie review show) was one of the last to get it !

One weak point in the UK widescreen TV market, though, is the virtual non-existence of widescreen TV's below the 24" mark. Now, I don't know about you, but I have a small bedroom with limited space to put my VCR, satellite decoder and TV (in fact, the three are stacked on top of each other).

There's no way I can fit a 24" widescreen set in the space available, so how come it's impossible to buy a portable widescreen set in the UK now ? Luckily, I got myself a Sony 16" widescreen set before they got discontinued and I love it to death, but when that needs replacing, I'll have to knock the wall through to the next room to fit a widescreen set in :-)

so...

[serenarae]

I work at a newly opened blockbuster, and we only carry widescreen format dvd's. Personally, I like them better than fullscreen, but if you have a tiny tv, it makes viewing kind of rough. The majority of our customers ask for fullscreen however, but that could be due to the fact that it's out in the boonies....

Superior?

[Becquerel]

It may well be better to see all of a movie widescreen on 4:3 screen so you don't loose anything...

but the point of movies at the cinema being in widescreen is that they fill your whole field of vision. Which is significantly biased to the horizontal ~220deg horiz and ~80deg vertical (presumably because cavemen did'nt worry about being attacked from the sky). But as far as i can tell there is little bias to the horizontal in field of view (the small area that is properly in focus ~30deg).So if i'm watching tv which usually only fills your field of view (unless you sit eye strainingly close to the screen)then i would rather have it fill that whole field rather than just a stip across the middle of it. The obvious example is the monitor that you are staring at, do you think it would be better in widescreen? i don't. It fills my field of view nicely

This is especially the case in the UK were you can buy the same amount of widescreen area on a 4:3 screen for less than the equivalent widescreen(which then plays 4:3 pictures in a tiny area).

Psychological Effects

[Moekandu]

There is a measurable psychological effect of the aspect ratio of a picture or film. Widescreen gives a more expansive, free, exciting effect, while narrow aspect ratios cause the viewer to feel more confined and pressured and trapped.

You can get the same effects with your composition. Vertical lines increase the drama in a scene. People arguing in a hallway, a conversation through jail bars, the cowboy showdown with the buildings looming on both sides of the characters.

Horizontal lines have the opposite effect. The angle and perspective you set your shot at will affect the audiences emotions.

The aspect ratio of the television is a hardware issue. Forcing an aspect ratio on a movie because of your TV screen is like diluting the gasoline in your car because you don't want to adjust the carburator when it's burning too rich. Or how about deliberately writing crappy code because you just can't handle the fact that the CPU isn't running at 100% when it's executing your software?

Ignore the black bars. You should be watching the movie, not the TV the movie is playing on.

Moekandu

"Action!"

Re:I personally find it infuriating....

[NomNet]

> I personally find it infuriating that I spent $1000 on a 32" T.V. and only 2/3 of it gets used when I watch a movie

So why on EARTH didn't you buy a Widescreen TV ?

> Flame all you want, but after the first month, approximately 100% of people who watch any movie will be watching it on a T.V., so why the hell wouldn't you design the movie to be seen on that medium?

Precisely. Seeing as about 90% of the TVs sold here in the UK are Widescreen, then it makes sense that movies are shot in Widescreen ! The USA will catch up soon, and if you'd bought a Widescreen TV when you had the chance, you'd be ready.